Grey screen on Tivo Series2 Standalone after Kernel update

[havok1977]

Guys, i need help; i am having trouble hacking a Series2 tivo using the ISO ptvlba48-4.04DD.iso, i am doing it to add the usual *nix binaries (less, vi, etc) and to have telnet and serial port access to it so i can do a procedure to manually add a custom channel listing.

Following this procedure:

http://homepage.mac.com/steventamm/tivo.html

I made a backup of the original hard drive, so i can fall back without a problem; then i copied the binaries to /var/hack and created the rc.sysinit.author script with everything i need to start at boot (basically "/bin/bash </dev/ttyS3 >& /dev/ttyS3 &"), and i used the tpip command to update the running Kernel with the one included in the ISO.
But my main issue is that after the hack, i try to boot the TiVo with the hacked kernel I only get a completely grey screen and the tivo never gets off the ground.

I checked beforehand and the box has OS version 7.2.0-oth-01-2-540, and the Kernel included in the ISO is marked as 7.2.2-oth-K1; i suspect that the version difference is causing the problem, but i have no way of knowing for sure.

Any help or comments will be appreciated.

[MungoJerrie]

I checked beforehand and the box has OS version 7.2.0-oth-01-2-540, and the Kernel included in the ISO is marked as 7.2.2-oth-K1; i suspect that the version difference is causing the problem, but i have no way of knowing for sure.
The problem is that if this is a "540" tivo (TSN starts with 540) you'll need to replace the EEPROM (i.e., desolder) in the unit with one that contains hacked PROM code to bypass filesystem security checks.

Killhdinitrd will not work on 540 units.

[havok1977]

Thanks for the info, i am not sure about the model (the hardware is at home, so i'll have to check tonight); but i feel this is the problem, i will search for PROM hacks.

[MungoJerrie]

the box has OS version 7.2.0-oth-01-2-540I'm pretty sure the PROM is your problem. The "540" in the S/W version is a dead giveaway; although 240's have "140" as the S/W version b/c they are pretty much the same architecture. In contrast to the 540, 240's and 140's are vulnerable to killhdinitrd. Somewhere in the Underground Forum I believe there is a "list of unhackable tivos".